In the Tale of Past Years (1113 AD), it is stated that Old East Slavic ? (Kavkasijsky? gory) came from Ancient Greek (Kafkasos),[6] which, according to M. A. Yuyukin, is a compound word that can be interpreted as the "Seagull's Mountain" (-?, , ? ?, , ? "a kind of seagull" + the reconstructed * ? "mountain" or "rock" richly attested both in place and personal names.)[7]

According to German philologists Otto Schrader and Alfons A. Nehring, the Ancient Greek word (Kafkasos) is connected to GothicHauhs ("high") as well as LithuanianKa?kas ("hillock") and Kaukarà ("hill, top").[8][6] British linguist Adrian Room points out that Kau- also means "mountain" in Pelasgian.[9]

The Transcaucasus region and southern Dagestan were the furthest points of Persian Parthian and later Sasanian expansions, with areas to the north of the Greater Caucasus range practically impregnable. The mythological Mount Qaf, the world's highest mountain that ancient Iranian lore shrouded in mystery, was said to be situated in this region, making the Caucasus the highest limit of the world.

It was also noted that in Nakh (Kov gas) means "gateway to steppe"[10]

The Transcaucasus borders the Greater Caucasus range and Southern Russia to its north, the Black Sea and Turkey to its west, the Caspian Sea to its east, and Iran to its south. It contains the Lesser Caucasus mountain range and surrounding lowlands. All of Armenia, Azerbaijan (excluding the northernmost parts) and Georgia (excluding the northernmost parts) are in the South Caucasus.

Three territories in the region claim independence but are recognised as such by only a handful or by no independent UN countries: , Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Abkhazia and South Ossetia are recognised by the majority of countries as part of Georgia, and as part of Azerbaijan.

Demographics

The region has many different languages and language families. There are more than 50 ethnic groups living in the region.[12] No fewer than three language families are unique to the area. In addition, Indo-European languages, such as Armenian and Ossetian, and Turkic languages, such as Azerbaijani and Karachay-Balkar, are spoken in the area. Russian is used as a lingua franca most notably in the North Caucasus.

History

Located on the peripheries of Turkey, Iran, and Russia, the region has been an arena for political, military, religious, and cultural rivalries and expansionism for centuries. Throughout its history, the Caucasus was usually incorporated into the Iranian world.[13] At the beginning of the 19th century, the Russian Empireconquered the territory from Qajar Iran.[13]

The site yields the earliest unequivocal evidence for presence of early humans outside the African continent;[15] and the Dmanisi skulls are the five oldest hominins ever found outside Africa, thereby doubling the presumed age of the human migration outside the continent.[16]

Middle Ages

As the Arsacid dynasty of Armenia (an eponymous branch of the Arsacid dynasty of Parthia) was the first nation to adopt Christianity as state religion (in 301 AD), and Caucasian Albania and Georgia had become Christian entities, Christianity began to overtake Zoroastrianism and pagan beliefs. With the Muslim conquest of Persia, large parts of the region came under the rule of the Arabs, and Islam penetrated into the region.[17] In the 10th century, the Alans (proto-Ossetians)[18] founded the Kingdom of Alania, that flourished in the Northern Caucasus, roughly in the location of latter-day Circassia and modern North Ossetia-Alania, until its destruction by the Mongol invasion in 1238-39. In the 12th century, the Georgian king David the Builder drove the Muslims out from Caucasus and made the Kingdom of Georgia a strong regional power. In 1194-1204 Georgian Queen Tamar's armies crushed new Seljuk Turkish invasions from the south-east and south and launched several successful campaigns into Seljuk Turkish-controlled Southern Armenia. The Georgian Kingdom continued military campaigns in the Caucasus region. As a result of her military campaigns and the temporary fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1204, Georgia became the strongest Christian state in the whole Near East area, encompassing most of the Caucasus stretching from Northern Iran and Northeastern Turkey to the North Caucasus. The Caucasus region would later be conquered by the Ottomans, Mongols, local kingdoms and khanates, as well as, once again, Iran.

In the second half of the 19th century, the Russian Empire also conquered the Northern Caucasus. In the aftermath of the Caucasian Wars, an ethnic cleansing of Circassians was performed by Russia in which the indigenous peoples of this region, mostly Circassians, were expelled from their homeland and forced to move primarily to the Ottoman Empire.[22][23]

Mythology

In Greek mythology the Caucasus, or Kaukasos, was one of the pillars supporting the world. After presenting man with the gift of fire, Prometheus (or Amirani in Georgian version) was chained there by Zeus, to have his liver eaten daily by an eagle as punishment for defying Zeus' wish to keep the "secret of fire" from humans.

The Roman poet Ovid placed Caucasus in Scythia and depicted it as a cold and stony mountain which was the abode of personified hunger. The Greek hero Jason sailed to the west coast of the Caucasus in pursuit of the Golden Fleece, and there met Medea, a daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis.

^Hunter, Shireen; et al. (2004). Islam in Russia: The Politics of Identity and Security. M.E. Sharpe. p. 3. (..) It is difficult to establish exactly when Islam first appeared in Russia because the lands that Islam penetrated early in its expansion were not part of Russia at the time, but were later incorporated into the expanding Russian Empire. Islam reached the Caucasus region in the middle of the seventh century as part of the Arab conquest of the Iranian Sassanian Empire.

^Yemelianova, Galina, Islam nationalism and state in the Muslim Caucasus. Caucasus Survey, April 2014. p. 3

^Memoirs of Miliutin, "the plan of action decided upon for 1860 was to cleanse [ochistit'] the mountain zone of its indigenous population", per Richmond, W. The Northwest Caucasus: Past, Present, and Future. Routledge. 2008.